Teacher Spotlight: Haleigh Huff: Teaching Science Beyond the Classroom, Inspiring Love for Geology and Adventure
Sep 21, 2023
Superintendent Mark Kopp
This episode of FCS Unscripted is riveting, to say the least, with our special guest being Haleigh Huff, a dedicated science teacher with a particular love for geology. Her unique perspective on teaching and her passion for connecting students to the natural world promises an engaging and enlightening conversation. Haley's tale takes us from her transition from biology to geology, her innovative community project with Franklin County's parks and city council department, to her annual trips to Iceland that bring learning to life for her students.
Haley's students aren’t just confined to the classroom—they're creating websites about local geological sites, making the wonders of the natural world accessible to their community from the comfort of their own backyard. All you need is to scan a QR code on plaques scattered around the city. As Haley shares her joy in leading the ski and snowboard club, you'll feel the infectious enthusiasm she has for helping students step out of their comfort zones and master new skills. Tune in to hear about Haley's favorite food, movie, and TV show and discover more about her incredible dedication to teaching. This is FCS Unscripted, where we shine a spotlight on the extraordinary individuals who make Franklin County Schools unique.
This episode of FCS Unscripted is riveting, to say the least, with our special guest being Haleigh Huff, a dedicated science teacher with a particular love for geology. Her unique perspective on teaching and her passion for connecting students to the natural world promises an engaging and enlightening conversation. Haley's tale takes us from her transition from biology to geology, her innovative community project with Franklin County's parks and city council department, to her annual trips to Iceland that bring learning to life for her students.
Haley's students aren’t just confined to the classroom—they're creating websites about local geological sites, making the wonders of the natural world accessible to their community from the comfort of their own backyard. All you need is to scan a QR code on plaques scattered around the city. As Haley shares her joy in leading the ski and snowboard club, you'll feel the infectious enthusiasm she has for helping students step out of their comfort zones and master new skills. Tune in to hear about Haley's favorite food, movie, and TV show and discover more about her incredible dedication to teaching. This is FCS Unscripted, where we shine a spotlight on the extraordinary individuals who make Franklin County Schools unique.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to FCS Unscripted. A new podcast for one team, fcs, where we look at the stories behind every one in Franklin County schools. Welcome to FCS Unscripted. Real excited today to be with you. This is Superintendent Mark Coppin. I am pleased to be joined by a wonderful teacher. We are having a teacher spotlight edition today and Haley Huff, a science teacher over at Western Hills High School, is our special guest today. Welcome, haley.
Speaker 2:
Hi, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:
We're excited to have you and get to get to know you a little bit. We're going to do several of these throughout the course of the year where, hopefully, we're going to get as many of our teachers on as we can so that we can get to know them. So, haley, just tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:
Well, I've been teaching here in Franklin County Public Schools for eight years now and I'm at Western Hills been there since I was student teaching, so it is my home and I have a love for our geology of you know our entire earth and Kentucky and Frankfurt, so I teach our earth and space science classes there and I'm just absolutely loving life right now.
Speaker 1:
Awesome. So why? Why geology? Why science in particular, in particular geology?
Speaker 2:
Well, you know we have a disconnect between the students now and our world around us. You know we go outside and we look at our phones, we look at the temperature on our phones, we look at our screens all the time and I want to be able to reconnect us with the nature around us. And going outside and saying, okay, why is that cloud shaped the way it is? Or I know why the weather is going to be the way it is because the leaves are turning. Or I know why the way this rock looks, because of the knowledge I learned in Ms Huff's class. So I want to reconnect students with the earth and just send them out my door every day with more knowledge about that.
Speaker 1:
When did you first start getting you know, interested in geology and in science?
Speaker 2:
That's so funny. So I went to college for biology and then I realized, ew, I hate this. I hate talking about cells and mitochondria, and it just did not connect with me. I didn't click. And so when I started taking my geology 101 class as you do, as most sophomores do in college I was like this is fascinating, this is a whole new world around us. And so I felt really connected with nature. I felt really connected when I was going out and doing my adventures and trips and travel and things like that, and I wanted people, more people, to experience that love for the world around us. So I felt the need to go into more of earth science teaching. Because that's my passion. I feel like I want to connect students to that passion as well.
Speaker 1:
Well, kentucky is a beautiful place. If you're into geology, there's a lot of, a lot of very unique things about our about our great Commonwealth, but thinking about all the different places that you've been, where is probably your favorite place that you could say is from a geological perspective? This was really cool.
Speaker 2:
Oh man. So every year I take a group of students to Iceland. I partner with different travel companies. I'm able to take students to different places all around the world, and this past year I took 19 students to Iceland and it is basically my class outside of those four walls. We got to see the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, we got to see deep ocean trenches, you got to see fresh lava flows and that stuff is, you know, it's like oh, I remember that from slide 23 of her class and when we talk about volcanology and so it's really coming to life and that class is, hands on, the coolest thing you're ever going to experience.
Speaker 1:
That's that's great. And isn't there something where you can swim in between the plates or something there?
Speaker 2:
Yes, yes, you can. I mean, that's where we were walking. We were walking right in between the the Eurasian plate and the North American plate, and so we were right there.
Speaker 1:
That's great, so let's let's talk about Western Hills for a second. What's the best thing about being a teacher at Western Hills?
Speaker 2:
Oh, all the stuff that we do, all the teachers getting involved in everything, and I just love that. See that. You know, the teachers get involved just as much as the students, if not more. So we have a lot of teachers that really want to get involved. I love seeing that among our teacher staff.
Speaker 1:
That's great. So what would you say is the most rewarding part of your job overall?
Speaker 2:
building those relationships and showing students the world around them. So I know that you're going to ask me here a little bit about what is a club that I sponsor and I do ski club. I sponsor our ski and snowboard club partnering with Perfect North, getting the students those discounted passes and for them to learn a new skill, for them to get out of their comfort zone. I feel like that is them growing as a person and I want to be able to push that throughout their entire lives.
Speaker 1:
And I don't know if everyone in our listening audience knows that we offer such things. So can you describe it a little bit further?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, so this past year this is my third year doing ski club and I partner with Perfect North Slopes to get our students a discounted pass for them and their friends, their family, and I bust them up there every Friday and during ski season all through January, february, a little bit into March, and they get to learn how to ski and snowboard and so by the time they start they might be a green, but then while they're leaving end of the season they might be a black diamond and that's really cool to see that they progress that much.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, that's. I mean that's really impressive, that's. And you don't take like superintendents on these trips, right.
Speaker 2:
He's never asked to go and I think he's more scared.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, oh, there's no question I would. I would crash and burn. There's no question about that. So let's talk about what you're doing in the community right now. You've got something that I learned about from hearing it from someone else where you're doing something with the Frankfurt community and Franklin County with geology.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 1:
So tell us all about it.
Speaker 2:
So you keep hearing me say I partner with, I partner with, I partner with our parks and city council department of Franklin County and we all see those little orange plaques downtown about the art installations and you can scan that little QR code on that plaque and you know I'm thinking okay, we see the art, I want us to see the world around us. So my students are developing websites as we speak and it's going to be centered around this plaque that we're going to put for everyone to see, accessible by everyone, and anyone walking downtown, anyone walking around can scan this QR code that's on this plaque and it takes them to the website that my students developed discussing this geological site that you might not be able to see. It could be a sinkhole, it could be a natural spring, it could be an anticline or sinkline, some kind of fault system on conformity. So it's being able to teach our community and bringing that knowledge outside those four walls.
Speaker 1:
And it's student driven, so you have your class working on the information, so the community can scan the code and they'll get to read something that was actually created by our students.
Speaker 2:
Yes, frankfurt's going to be so smart.
Speaker 1:
I love it. That's really exciting. Well, I think it's probably a good time to go ahead and do some fun facts. All right, so, hailey Huff, what is your favorite food?
Speaker 2:
I love a good pizza by the slice.
Speaker 1:
All right, what's your? Well, probably shouldn't say it, because we don't want to get any of our businesses upset, but because all of them are good.
Speaker 2:
Oh man, I would love to shout out a business, though, yeah.
Speaker 1:
So what is your favorite movie of all time?
Speaker 2:
Oh man, secret Life of Walter Mitty Hands Down.
Speaker 1:
Wow. The original or the, or the remake.
Speaker 2:
The remake with Ben Stiller.
Speaker 1:
Okay, ben Stiller. The original was Danny K. Back in the day. I'm showing my age there.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, different generations.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, the same guy that was in White Christmas.
Speaker 2:
Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, so all right, sorry. Favorite TV show or streaming show the Office, oh yeah. Yeah, you can watch that a million times, I'm getting Office tattoo.
Speaker 2:
Sorry, boss, that's great.
Speaker 1:
Is it going to say Shrewt Beat Farm?
Speaker 2:
Yes, exactly it was going to be Shrewt Farms Bed and Breakfast. You already know that's great.
Speaker 1:
All right. So what about let's do this one, your favorite breakfast cereal?
Speaker 2:
Oh, the silence on that one was real Right Breakfast cereal.
Speaker 1:
Did we need to Like we need to have crickets.
Speaker 2:
This might show my age. I don't think they make the cereal anymore. Muffin tops.
Speaker 1:
Oh my really, yeah, do you remember those? I don't.
Speaker 2:
They had like chocolate chip muffin tops, blueberry muffin tops, nice, it was just the tops of muffins.
Speaker 1:
And your last one and you're off of the Fun Fact hot seat Favorite type of music or favorite musical performer.
Speaker 2:
I love Lady Gaga. I love her Incredible.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I just saw recently, by the way, that before she was famous she was actually in the Sopranos. She had a cameo in the Sopranos.
Speaker 2:
So that's pretty crazy. I think you're more fun of the full facts, the Fun Facts, and I am so.
Speaker 1:
Hailey Huff, you are amazing. We appreciate you being on the show and getting to share your information and your story with everyone, and thank you for being here.
Speaker 2:
We appreciate you, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:
All right, that's just a little sound that means the show is ending. Ha ha ha. Well, that wraps it up for this week's episode of FCS Unscripted. Thank you for listening in and I encourage you to subscribe and follow this weekly podcast, where we will share updates, information and interviews with hashtag. Everyone the wonderful students and staff who make up one team, FCS have a great week everybody.